Henry Hudson: A Brief Statement of His Aims and His AchievementsJanvier, Thomas A. (Thomas Allibone)
History
Henry Hudson: A Brief Statement of His Aims and His Achievements
Janvier, Thomas A. (Thomas Allibone)
Explorers -- Great Britain -- Biography; Hudson, Henry, -1611
The log that has been preserved of this voyage was kept by Robert
Juet; who was Hudson's mate on his second voyage, and who was mate
again on Hudson's fourth voyage--until his mutinous conduct caused
him to be deposed. What rating he had on board the "Half Moon" is
not known; nor do we know whether he had, or had not, a share in
the mutiny that changed the ship's course from east to west. With a
suspicious frankness, he wrote in his log: "Because it is a journey
usually knowne I omit to put downe what passed till we came to the
height of the North Cape of Finmarke, which we did performe by the
fift of May (stilo novo), being Tuesday." To this he adds the
observed position on May 5th, 71° 46' North, and the course, "east,
and by south and east," and continues: "After much trouble, with
fogges sometimes, and more dangerous ice. The nineteenth, being
Tuesday, was close stormie weather, with much wind and snow, and
very cold. The wind variable between the north north-west and
north-east. We made our way west and by north till noone."
[Illustration: DUTCH SHIPS OF HUDSON'S TIME.
FROM DE VEER. DRIE SEYLAGIEN, AMSTERDAM, 1605]
His abrupt transition from the fifth to the nineteenth of May
covers the time in which the mutiny occurred. Practically, his log
begins almost on the day that the ship's course was changed. In the
smooth concluding paragraph of this same log, to be cited later, he
passes over unmentioned the mutiny that occurred on the homeward
voyage. Judging him by the facts recorded in the accounts of the
voyage into Hudson's Bay, it is a fair assumption that in both of
these earlier mutinies Juet had a hand.
I wish that we could find the bond that held Hudson and Juet
together. That Juet could write, and that he understood the science
of navigation--although those were rare accomplishments among
seamen in his time--fail sufficiently to account for Hudson's
persistent employment of him. For my own part, I revert to my
theory of fatalism. It is my fancy that this "ancient man"--as he
is styled by one of his companions--was Hudson's evil genius; and I
class him with the most finely conceived character in Marryat's
most finely conceived romance: the pilot Schriften, in "The Phantom
Ship." Just as Schriften clung to the younger Van der Decken to
thwart him, so Juet seems to have clung to Hudson to thwart him;
and to take--in the last round between them--a leading part in
compassing Hudson's death.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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